My new job has kept me really busy. I haven’t gone out as much or produced as many shows I have in the past, and I think that’s because my professional life has been challenging in a good way. It’s been a long time that I’ve been this challenged and I needed it.

I’m still writing though. I’m currently working on a new novel titled A Farewell to Arms With a Chainsaw, which you can see the drafts in progress on my Instagram feed. Eventually, I’ll produce my next Saturday Night Special. I just need to regain focus to those aspects of my life I’ve let lapse.

I’ve had a lot of stuff come out over the last few months, so I’m going to only focus on one in particular.

White Knuckle Chapbooks put out an e-chapbook of 10 of my ribcage poems. I remixed these in a prose format. Click here to read it.

I’ll be in Tampa next week for AWP and I’ll be part of a panel for the first time. The information is below if you happen to be doing that kind of a thing.

Earlier this year, I wrote my second novel (See: July Update for more details) and I am pleased to announce that it’s been named a semi-finalist for YesYes Books first open fiction reading period. I’ll have until November 1 to clean it up and submit it but this was a really nice surprise. Below is a list of all the semi-finalists.

I am currently working on three additional projects, because that’s what I do to channel my energy and keep myself distracted from the ever growing dire political situation. They are as follows:

I’ve been working on a wrestling novel now for about 34 days. I’ve taken a similar approach to the second novel where I’ve been posting first drafts twice a day, every day. I haven’t been as strict as doing this every day because I’m having a harder time figuring out where this one is going, where I figured out pretty quick where Teenage Wasteland but I think it’s getting there. If you aren’t following along on my Instagram feed, you can do that here.

One is a wrestling novel and the other is a collection of flash fiction called 99 Stories of God With a Chainsaw, which is a response to Joy Williams’s 99 Stories of God. I’m a huge advocate of flash fiction so I read whatever I can, especially when it comes to writers who are regarded as flash fiction writers of the first tier. I did not like 99 Stories of God at all. It wasn’t quite like Diane Williams’s flash fiction (which her idea of flash fiction seems to be micro-episodes of Ren & Stimpy but with 95% more white people) but there was a lack of an emotional connection for me in reading these stories. They were more interested in being clever than telling an actual story. This one I’m also doing daily but not sharing them unless they are published somewhere. You can read two of them below:

I’ve started a separate Twitter and Instagram for my Extinction Porn micro-stories. I stumbled onto this idea after The Atlantic responded to the New York Magazine article about how doomed we are from a climate change perspective and The Atlantic called the New York Magazine “extinction porn”. I’ve never heard the phrase before and decided to play with it. Here’s one of them below.
You can follow the Twitter feed here.

If you followed my Instagram feed from mid-February from late May, you may have noticed that I was posting about 500 or so words of content every day for 98 days. I’ve been depressed about the current presidential administration and I needed do something to cope with this depression and with this coping mechanism, I ended up writing a second novel, which I didn’t plan or expect to do this year, let alone any year, but as if all of my projects, the ideas are stumbled upon.

When I set out to start this project, I remember something Ben Tanzer told me or said on a podcast about how he wrote anywhere (typically during his commutes to and from work) and I took that method to heart when I started down the path of writing this novel, using Google Docs to write on my iPad, even my iPhone. Instagram kept me accountable about making sure I got my 500+ words in daily. Writing in this way was out of my comfort zone but it was worth doing, and I think that’s important for any creative person is to do things that makes them uncomfortable.

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Here are some excerpts of the novel (I’m calling it Teenage Wasteland: An American Love Story until an editor suggests otherwise.)

What I’m going to provide instead are some suggestions of how you can also remember the Orlando 49:

Vote for political candidates who believe in common sense gun control across local, state, and national elections (who also have a chance of winning).

Donate time and/or money to a local LGBTQIA organization. I donate somewhat regularly to the Zebra Coalition. This is an organization that provides support and resources to LGBTQIA youth (13-24). These are young people who are often at the most risk of being made homeless or subjected to violence by family members who disagree with who their children love.

At the beginning of There Will Be Words (May 2011), there wasn’t anything like it. There were prose readings happening either on local college campuses that weren’t well advertised or occurring amongst insular writing groups but prose didn’t really have a public perception in Orlando. Prior to this, I ran a poetry slam from January 2001 to April 2011. In 2001, there was an open mic or two that was dedicated to poetry/spoken word, or events that happened on local college campuses, but most of the open mics were dedicated to music of the singer/songwriter variety. Over the ten years of running a slam, spoken word/poetry emerged and there was a spoken word/poetry show almost every night of the week in Orlando. Towards the end of the poetry slam, less people became interested in it, and I felt there were two factors behind it:

Frequency: the slam was weekly and that’s a high demand from your audience to keep coming week in and week out. Some slams are able to do this based on their location and fanbase. There were some weeks that we had a very lean turnout and other weeks that we had a good turnout. I was stubborn and thought that the show needed to happen every week, too, not knowing any better.

Saturation: the slam started out being something special early on, something new, and it attracted attention. We hit our initial peak when we sent our first team to the National Poetry Slam and then people lost interest because the team didn’t do well. We worked our way back up to getting a dedicated base that stuck around for awhile. As the years went on, more spoken word/poetry shows emerged, and they provided an alternative venue for performers who didn’t want to compete in slam, who felt more comfortable in the safety of an open mic, and they didn’t need the slam. We also hit our second peak from 2009-2010 when the 2009 team went to the semifinals for the first time at the National Poetry Slam. When the 2010 team didn’t match the previous team’s progress, people lost interest again. I tried switching the show from weekly to monthly and it struggled with attendance. I should have known when hardly anyone came to the tenth anniversary show that the slam was officially dead. Two months later, when no one came to the monthly slam (partially because it took place on St. Patrick’s Day), I decided it was time to end it and move on.

I embraced these lessons learned when I started There Will Be Words, doing a monthly show, curating the readings, making it something special. But even with the monthly frequency, saturation came back. More reading series and pop-up literary events have happened over the last six years and There Will Be Words has been struggling with attendance for awhile. It’s a great problem that Orlando has evolved from a literary perspective where we have a wide array of literary events that are actually known by the general public.

I’ve been revitalized as of late running the occasional poetry slam, partially because of the audience-as-judges element, partially because I’m not sending teams or individuals to national competitions. I’ve made it fun by introducing a title belt component and taking a three-ring circus approach. I’m moving There Will Be Words towards a direction that integrates the poetry and the prose into it, and where I do it three or four times a year, rather than doing this show monthly. I need to make this event special again so I can get people to come out, to support it.

I’m going to be running my Performing Your Work workshop at this Saturday’s Litlando, an awesome one day writing conference. I enjoyed doing this last year and this year is no different.

How it works is you have two minutes to read your work and me and my panel provide feedback about your performance. From my experience in writing programs, performance isn’t something that’s taught or considered important and this workshop is a way to kick that aspect of writing off for you.

Tickets are $25 ($15 if you’re a student). All proceeds will go to Page 15. To get your tickets (and maybe be a part of the performance your work workshop), click here.

I need to stop using the word “never” whenever I say that I won’t ever do a project again. I’ve done this with running a poetry slam (which I started doing on and off again in 2015), writing new Jesus Christ, Boy Detective stories (I’ve written a one-act and a three-act play) and my Yelp review project.

Some background: from September 2013 until early 2015, I wrote prose poems disguised as Yelp reviews and posted them on Yelp. I also submitted them to literary journals. As literary journals published them, I took them down. Yelp started catching on and took them down as well for violating their Terms of Service (ToS). Once they took down over 40 of them in a great purge around late 2014, I knew it was time for me to stop. I said then I wouldn’t ever do them again. Then a couple of things happened.

First, I got into Art in Odd Places – Orlando last year because of my Yelp review project and I started writing Yelp reviews reviewing each project. There were over 40 projects to review but I only got to about half of them. Overall, they were well received.

Second, we elected someone not qualified to be president and I started writing Yelp reviews reviewing the various properties that our president (still) owns, and then moved onto government buildings that his (incompetent) cabinet members would inhabit. After the site admins took down more of my Yelp reviews, they emailed me this.

After that, I posted two more reviews, one on Yelp’s HQ building and the other on Melbourne International Airport. Those were the last straw for the site admins.

I have no regrets doing what I did. I only wish the site admins had a better sense of humor about it, a sense of artistry. There are a lot of shitty Yelp reviews out there that, while they may confirm to the ToS, don’t necessarily have anything to do about the place that they reviewed.

I have a favor to ask: if you enjoyed this iteration of the Yelp review project, please pick up a copy of my book, Pick How You Will Revise A Memory, which contains some of the Yelp reviews from 2013-2015. Also, reviews about it for Goodreads would be helpful (which you can add over here.)

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Refer below to some recently published work that I have either been too lazy or too depressed about the current state of affairs to properly promote.

I refer to myself as a hobbit from time to time because a) I like to walk long distances and b) my feet tend to be dried and cracked probably because of a) but also because I don’t moisturize my skin enough. Next week, I am indeed going on a journey, a long one, but not walking because it would take me weeks to get to where I’m going.

January 24 – Cool as F*** Reading Series: I’m excited that I’ll get to meet Bud Smith (finally) and get to read with this amazing line up of writers.

January 25 – J. Bradley Reading: There’s a ton of people who I have not heard read before at this one that I finally get to. (I promise I’ll read something different at each show if you come to both).

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I’ve hit the post-MFA emotional rut that seems to happen after getting conferred with your MFA. I was driven by imposed deadlines (and maintaining a 4.0 GPA) and, while it was stressful at times, I appreciated the structure and the discipline needed to manage all of that. I’m working on some new things but it still feels a little directionless at times. This emotional lull seems to always happen at the end of something big. I have to constantly remind myself to let the next big project come find me, not the other way around.

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And now for some recent publication news:

I have a poem as part of Indolent Books’s Transitions: Poems in the Aftermath. Please check that out over here. I would also encourage you to check out the rest of the poems in the series, as well.

I have new flash fiction in Stoneslide Corrective’s Aftermath issue, which you can read over here. Again, I would also encourage you to check out the rest of the pieces in this series, as well.

I have new flash fiction over in the inaugural issue of (b)OINK, which you can read over here. Yes, I am going to again encourage you to check out the rest of the content in this issue, as well.

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I’ve been posting Yelp reviews again, partially to promote my Yelp review collection, Pick How You Will Revise A Memory. You can follow me on Yelp over here. If you like these reviews, please consider getting a copy of my Yelp review collection over here.

Lastly, please also add the following to your Goodreads. They both need more love and attention.

I’ve been quiet here lately. I was on the homestretch towards finishing my MFA program and as of Monday, I’m officially graduating with a 4.0 GPA. This is a huge personal accomplishment as the highest GPA I ever maintained was back in elementary school (mostly Bs).

My MFA experience was good. I found a program that was online only, which didn’t require any travel on my part. I was able to take workshops and classes outside of my comfort zone or expertise, such as narrative journalism, magical realism, the literature of war and the apocalypse, and playwriting. I had professors who encouraged my weirdness throughout the experience. I couldn’t have asked for anything more.

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I have a new piece of flash fiction over in Microfiction Monday, which you can read here.

I have a new Yelp review poem over at New Verse News, which you can read here.

My Yelp review prose poem collection could use some love over on Goodreads. You can go here to add it to your shelf. You can also buy a copy over here.

I’m currently recovering from my first Art in Odd Places as an artist. This was the first time I crossed over into public art and I learned a couple of things:

Don’t have a project that relies on power. I didn’t realize the limitations that power requirements would cause in terms of where I could have my digital frame showing my Yelp reviews. I also didn’t realize the role the sun played in terms of people being able to see said project.

Set a performance schedule. It’s challenging to be with your project for the duration of the festival. I underestimated the endurance that it required (and overestimated my own endurance, which is a personal issue I have to deal with). It would have been easier on me physically if I set times that I would be there.

Would I do this again? Absolutely. It allowed me to engage people who typically don’t read poetry or literature in general. I have an idea on what I would do for next year if the curators are willing to have me back again.

Click here to watch the project.I also wrote new Yelp reviews reviewing projects at Art in Odd Places (there were 41 and I could only write 21). You can check out the ones posted on AiOP Orlando’s Instagram feed here.

My Yelp review collection, Pick How You Will Revise a Memory, is still available for pre-order. Go here to pre-order a copy. You should be able to use the code NEWTITLESFALL2016 to get $3.00 off until Friday, November 18.

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A ton has happened as well on the flash fiction front/Jesus Christ, Boy Detective front.

First, I talked about the musical DNA of Jesus Christ, Boy Detective over at Largehearted Boy. You can read about it (and listen to the playlist) over here.

I also interviewed John Jodizo for Maudlin House, which you can read here.

Also, I recommend heading on over to this article to see what organizations you can donate to. They will need all the help they can get to fight against the incoming sexist, racist, xenophobic Trump administration.